(Immediately after viewing) Many people are familiar with the comic book icon that is Judge Dredd, the sci-fi super-cop whose loyalty lies only with the law and nothing else. But after a mediocre movie starring Sylvester Stallone in 1995, he has been fading back into obscurity. Even the film I’m about to discuss (Dredd, which came out in 2012) passed through theaters with little incident. Unfortunately, the movie didn’t even make enough at the box office to cover its initial budget, possibly due to the fact that it was only released in 3D, for whatever reason. It seemed like Judge Dredd exploits were doomed to remain off the big screen and only in the pages of comic books. But recently Dredd has been put up for viewing on Netflix, where it has been garnering a sort of cult following. This is where I first heard of it; having a friend recommend it to me. I vaguely remembered watching the first one (the 1995 version), and thinking it was campy in that 80s science fiction movie kind of way despite coming out in the mid-90s. However, I was greatly surprised when I watched Dredd. While the movie didn't adhere directly to the plot or visual aspects of its source material, it nevertheless was able to provide a proper feel for the film. Dredd felt like a Judge Dredd movie, rather than just a generic sci-fi movie like the 1995 version. The acting was fantastic, the audience was able to tell the emotions and intentions of Karl Urban (who played Judge Dredd)without him ever taking off his iconic helmet. Overall, Dredd felt like an action movie, but not necessarily in a bad way. I feel like it knew what it was and didn't try to be anything more or less than that. Because Dredd understood itself there was no need for unnecessary distraction; no unneeded romantic subplot tacked on, no sick kids or family drama. The film was just about two cops trying to escape a building, and somehow that was all the more compelling.

(~Two weeks after viewing)

Given a good degree of time to order my thoughts on Dredd, I've come to several conclusions as to why I enjoyed it so much. On the surface, Dredd would appear to be the average shoot-‘em-up summer action flick with a slight science fiction twist. But Dredd does some very interesting things to avoid falling into the traps that those sort of movies usually fall into. Firstly, the lack of a romantic sub-plot is a lot more important than it would first appear. The two protagonists Dredd and Anderson are male and female respectively, of opposing temperaments and personalities, and are forced into a dire situation that is unlike any they have faced before. Usually this series of qualifiers would entail a somewhat empty and cliché romance that would ultimately distract from the plot. However, Dredd takes a far more realistic approach to this, in that it ignores the concept entirely. Dredd and Anderson have completely opposing personalities, and even by the end of the movie they've only known each other for a little over a day, as well as being in an extreme circumstance ensuring they focus entirely at the task at hand. In reality, the two wouldn't have the inclination, time, or patience for a heartfelt, face-sucking, set-to-music French kiss. Because this cliché wasn't in the film, there was more time for actual individual characterization of Dredd and Anderson, building more of a personal connection between them and the audience.Dredd also avoids the concept of “spectacle creep” very efficiently, which is the event of a franchise (or just media in general, if you ask me) making the events of fiction bigger, louder, more spectacular, and “better.” You can see this in every recent action science fiction movie to come out during the summer. Everything is about saving the world, back-lit by impossible and spectacular scenery, and set to beautiful orchestral music. Eventually, there’s a point where an audience starts getting less and less awed by these displays, leading to an attempt to create an even bigger and better spectacle for them by the creators of media. Dredd completely sidesteps this occurrence by having a very simple, yet very personal plot; Judges Dredd and Anderson are trapped in a massive apartment building by the gang leader “Mama,” who has sent members of her criminal organization to hunt down and kill them. They must use all their abilities, experience, and equipment to survive, escape, and take Mama down. That’s it. There are no time bombs strapped to nukes, no assassins stalking the president, and no invading alien fleet. Just Dredd and Anderson fighting for their lives to survive the night. And it’s this very simple, yet very personal and engaging plot which cements the audience’s connection between them and the characters on screen. To top it off, instead of the typical aforementioned orchestral music, Dredd ops for the unusual (yet very fitting) choice of harsh new-age industrial music to better relay the setting of the movie and the emotions the protagonists. Overall, I’m very disappointed Dredd didn’t create a smash hit at the box office, but I have several theories as to why that is. Firstly, as I mentioned two weeks ago, it was only released in 3D (for some ungodly reason) possibly the work of some executive somewhere. 3D is a gimmick, but it’s also a very expensive one, requiring the audience to dig significantly deeper into their pockets to enjoy a film, directly hurting profits. Secondly, that summer both The Dark Knight Returns and The Avengers had recently graced the box office, meaning audiences were most likely comic-book movied out. Combine those two factors, along with mediocre promotion, and a potentially outrageously successful movie becomes an obscure cult-classic.